"The backpackers are treated badly. You will get people coming to the area to work and they are getting $30 for a whole days' work because they're not professional pickers and they're not getting the time put in to teach them how to do the job," he said.

"They will give other backpackers that feedback and if you have a look on the internet you will see the bad remarks about Bundaberg and certain farms ... and that affects tourism in the region."

It's a fundamental human yearning to be a part of something bigger than one's self, and maybe that's what drove my mate Ash to die, far from home, in a bloody foreign war against Islamic State, writes C August Elliott.